Archive of Our Own

There was no joy in the security of thick stone walls, and no comfort in the softness of the wide bed. The humid air felt suffocating. It was leaving a thin layer of moisture on his skin and making him feel filthy, despite two water showers taken in the last three hours. In that moment Jedi Master Luke Skywalker hated his room in the old Massasi temple. It was too hot, too humid, too bare, and, most importantly, too big for one person.

And he had no one to share it with. Hadn’t had anyone for almost two years.

Why had Callista left him? Why couldn’t she trust him enough to believe he would love her with or without the Force? What changed her so much that, in the end, he was barely able to recognize the warm and loving spirit he came to know on the Eye of Palpatine in that bitter, self-hating woman? He had been mulling over those questions for two years now, having accepted the inevitable conclusion intellectually, but not emotionally. His head reigned during day’s bustle; but when the clear orange light of Yavin faded, in the resonant solitude of his rooms, his heart took charge, capturing him in a vicious circle of ‘why’s’ and ‘how’s’ that he was equally unable either to banish or answer.

He was Luke Skywalker, the leader of the New Jedi Order, the brother of the most powerful head of government in the Universe, the Galaxy’s golden hope, adored by millions of people who had no idea who or what he was. He was also a thirty-something-year-old human male, who hadn’t been intimate with another being for almost two years.

And wasn’t the former a direct cause for the latter?

With an uncharacteristic flare of temper he flung his overheated and damp pillow at a wall and threw away the light blanket. One thing was absolutely certain: he wasn’t going to get any sleep this night. Might as well give up and try something different.

Luke dressed quickly, without turning on the lights. Their artificial glow would have been beyond his scope of tolerance right now. He didn’t bother with robes, either; they weren’t suited for what he had in mind. Simple military camouflage was much better, with the added benefit of the memories from his younger and much less troubled days associated with it. The pants were a bit tight. How many years passed since he last donned these garments? Three? Four? He didn’t remember.

The door slid aside without a noise. Luke slipped into the dimly lit passage, studiously checking his surroundings and meticulously covering his presence in the Force. He didn’t want to meet anyone; he was not in the mood to endure polite questions and respectfully lowered eyes right now. One corner of his lips lowered in a bitter grimace. Creeping through his own home, avoiding his own students, running, basically... from what? Himself?

It wasn’t supposed to end up like this. It wasn’t what he dreamed of. It wasn’t fair. But it was his life, and he had to learn how to live it. He didn’t have an alternative.

He also had a class to teach early in the morning. And the last thing the new students needed to see was a living example of how desperately unhappy the life of a Jedi could be. They would start whispering behind his back, making assumptions about the cause of his foul mood. And, most probably, their assumptions would be the right ones.

“Filswik,” he whispered suddenly. Tionne. Tionne and her abundant sympathy. No, the jungle was definitely the place for him to be right now.

Out, out. Away from the enormous hulk of the Temple that dominated its surroundings even in darkness, away from the heavy heat waves it emitted. Away from ‘Master Skywalker’ shell, with its duties and restrictions. Run, Luke, run. Run toward the misty coolness of the jungle, run toward freedom.

Yavin IV forests weren’t half as bad as Dagobah’s swamps, and he managed the pace easily. It took almost all his concentration, though, to evade protruding roots and thorny branches. The jungle at night was the big predators’ kingdom; in many ways it made this time of a day cycle the safest one. Big animals were easy to spot and easy to avoid.

A root, a twig, an enormous trunk with rough, scaled bark. A hive of piranha beetles, sleeping under a pile of half-rotten leaves. Take left, far, far left. A krayt dragon would be less dangerous than a hive of those insects, especially if awakened rudely. Run, Luke, run...

A sudden gleam of flickering light, filtered through the three branches, seized his attention. It was such an unexpected sight that it made him stop, abruptly enough to have vertigo for a moment. There shouldn’t be any strangers on Yavin IV, at least none that he wouldn’t know of. He moved closer, using the lush vegetation for cover, his advance completely noiseless. Less than twenty meters further, and he was able to observe the scene.

A tall fire was blazing a good three meters up from the white sand that covered this part of a small beach. Directly before him and a good ten meters behind the fire, a stone ridge with sharp, rugged edges was barely visible in misty darkness, efficiently protecting the bonfire, and whoever set it, from any unexpected assault. A barricade of extremely thorny bushes occupied the left side, preventing any possibility of getting close from this direction as well. To his right, the dark, shiny waters of a lake completed the setup. In fact, the only side through which it was possible to reach this hideout was the one where he was standing. Whoever set the camp here knew what he was doing.

There was no one on the site at the moment. Just an old, battered backpack sitting on the sand, a stack of neatly cut firewood, and a trail of hastily discarded clothes leading from the fire to the water, along with a string of footprints. Luke smiled. The clothes were unidentifiable – a plain dark military-looking outfit very much like his own, but the backpack was an old friend. It had belonged to him once, then somehow it migrated into Han’s possession, and at some point in time, he wasn’t exactly sure when, his brother-in-law passed it on to Kyp Durron. It was strange that he hadn’t noticed Kyp’s presence sooner, but...

He stretched out a light probe and smiled again. Kyp had got much better at shielding his considerable presence in the Force. If Luke didn’t know to look out specifically for him, he might have never detected Kyp at all. So, his most troublesome apprentice was back. It was a good thing – he could use some help with the new students, and there was no one better than Kyp Durron to whip an amorphous bunch of novices into a cohesive group willing to work twelve hours a day – and gladly. The younger man had a natural knack for inspirational leadership, the trait which both Kam Solusar and Luke himself sadly lacked.

He took a step ahead, intending to join his former student, and stopped suddenly.

What the frack he was doing? He came here to be alone, and no doubt Kyp had the same intention. In the temple, they often enough joked about Kyp’s tendency to vanish into the jungle any time he didn’t feel particularly sociable, for Luke to know that. And why did he feel this sudden desire to socialize, when only a short time ago he was going out of his way to avoid any possible contact?

He didn’t have time to think about that. A quiet splash sounded over the lake and Kyp’s head emerged from the water, exactly at the edge between the circle of light from the fire and the night’s darkness. The broad, straight shoulders appeared next, then the smooth, hairless chest with clearly defined pectoral muscles, gradually tapering into the slim waist which, as Luke very well knew, was an object of envy of every female student in the praxeum. Kyp took another step and stopped abruptly, tilting his head to the side, as if listening to something.

For a brief moment, as gut-wrenching as a sudden fall from a precipice, Luke thought that he had been discovered. For some reason this idea bathed him in a hot wave of shame, as if he was spying on people making love. But in the next instant, Kyp’s head turned further and the movement resolved itself, with a mass of thick, black, very wet hair being swung over his right shoulder. Then the young man leaned forward slightly and started wringing it out with quick, habitual motions.

Luke stopped breathing. A vision appeared before his eyes: Callista, standing in a very similar pose in a very similar lake, doing the same thing Kyp was doing now. She had been trying to seduce him then, half-jokingly, half-seriously, and put every bit of her charm into the process. The show had been incredible, and he was suitably flattered, not to mention excited.

And it paled in comparison to one he was looking at right now. Kyp was unselfconscious where Callista had been deliberate; his palms were twisting the black strands roughly, whereas hers had been almost too gentle to get the job done. Calli’s sophisticated artistry, however, didn’t hold a candle to Kyp’s natural grace, the same way that even the best painting was never able to convey the natural beauty of a sunset.

Another splash jerked him out of his reminiscence, and Luke opened his eyes, wondering briefly when he had managed to close them. Kyp was getting out of the lake, and the black, dense waters whirled around his long, lean legs. Flashes of reflecting orange light danced on the tanned, taut, water-glossed skin, outlining each muscle, and got captured eventually in the only part of the young man’s body that was even darker than his skin: a clearly outlined triangle of pubic hair, as glossy black as the ones he was wringing out just a minute ago. And resting in this triangle...

Luke swallowed hard, trying to banish the lump that took residence in his throat. He had got over being shocked by nudity during his first months in the military. The life of a Rebel hadn’t exactly offered a lot of privacy. Still, he had always blushed and averted his eyes when one of his roommates was getting out of the refresher stark naked, using the only towel to dry his hair. It had made him a butt of more than one joke, and he strongly suspected that some of his comrades had been doing that on purpose, just for the pleasure of seeing him out of sorts, but he had never been able to suppress his reaction.

Now, though... Oh, he was blushing, all right. He could practically feel his cheeks getting hotter than the flames that blazed before him. But Luke’s eyes were glued to the quiescent, but still sizeable shaft as if it was the most beautiful thing he had seen in his life. That, and the prominent relief of a pelvic bone above, and an ideally round curve of a buttock that flexed with each step, and a hint of a shadow of the concavity beside the hipbone that was clearly visible now, when Kyp was close, so close...

If he wasn’t mortified by the possibility of being discovered, he would have groaned aloud. It was incredibly difficult to suppress any outward reaction, to stay still and silent. What was going on with him? Luke doubted he would be able to take a step now even if his life depended on it; his body simply wouldn’t obey, rendered limp by a heavy, smothering feeling he had never experienced before. No woman affected him like that; not Callista, not Gaeriel, not even Mara, who often inhabited the wildest of his dreams. He sucked in a slow breath, realizing suddenly that his lungs were starving for oxygen. So deep was his concentration on the sight before him that he had forgotten even to breathe.

Kyp, meanwhile, appeared unaware of the fact that he was watched. Unlike Luke’s former roommates, he hadn’t even bothered with a towel, allowing the water droplets to slide down his body, painting the bronzed skin with a multitude of shining streaks. Then he bent down, and this time Luke had to bite his knuckles in order to stifle a moan. A cold, sticky film of sweat appeared on his back. Kyp wasn’t doing that on purpose, was he?

Apparently not. He was just rummaging in the pockets of his discarded pants for something. In a couple of seconds he found it and straightened again. It was a narrow leather thong, or a piece of lacing, Luke wasn’t sure. However, its purpose became clear immediately, since Kyp quickly stuffed it in his mouth and began to braid his hair, which was quite a bit longer now than the last time Luke had seen his former student.

The process didn’t take long; Kyp was obviously much more concerned with practicality than aesthetics. After the previous display Luke found this one much easier to tolerate; the quick motion of the long fingers and the shift of muscles of the raised hands looked almost innocuous. And the familiar, sharply drawn face was much less troublesome to look at than certain much lower body parts. At least he could breathe now. Luke concentrated on that task with the desperate devotion of a drowning man. He had to get his body under control, if not his mind, for if he didn’t, he had no hope of getting out of this trap unnoticed.

But what in the name of all twenty-six moons of Yavin was the blasted boy doing now? Why he was stepping so close to the fire? Way too close for simple warmth; almost close enough to burn. Even in the treacherous, flickering light of the bonfire, Luke could see that Kyp’s skin began to darken further and assumed a reddish hue. Still, Kyp stood where he was, with his head thrown back and his body as tight as a coiled spring.

Luke was so perplexed that it removed some of the constriction from his pants, making his arousal less acute and allowing some room for breathing and thinking. Was it some kind of a masochistic ritual? Luke never thought Kyp was even a bit inclined to pain games; even with his almost unbelievably high pain tolerance, the young Jedi usually did everything possible to avoid it. That was completely understandable, taking his past into account. But what was he doing then?

Luke opened his mouth to call to the younger man, to snap him out of whatever it was, but managed to remember his circumstances just in time. In any case, it would have been unnecessary. Kyp took three steps back, and stopped there. A visible shudder ran through his body, relaxing the muscles in its wake, making his posture unstrained and natural. He bent one leg slightly, and cocked his hips, letting his hands hang down limply at his sides.

Breathtaking.

Luke blinked, trying to banish the haze of lust and curiosity. It was time to go; whatever Kyp was doing, it certainly wasn’t intended for strange eyes, and he had no right to peep. He just needed some distraction, a gust of wind, or some night creature’s cry, to cover the noise he might make with his retreat...

“Are you going to stand there the entire night, or would you deign to join me?”

Kyp’s clear, amused voice rang through the night air with the power of a wakening gong. Luke’s first impulse was just to turn his back and run, but it would have been such an obvious cowardice that he dismissed the thought immediately. The least he owed his student, after snooping on him, would be admitting it and facing whatever Kyp had to say about his action.

Luke sighed and stepped out from the guarding shadows. He didn’t even want to think of what color his face was right now. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to spy on you.”

Kyp just waved his hand dismissively. “I know.”

“How did you know I was here? I thought I concealed my presence.”

The youngster tilted his head, looking at him with an infuriatingly amused smirk. “You slipped. If I knew that the sight of my naked body could throw you so much off-balance, I would have sparred with you in the altogether all the time.”

Farkled, Luke thought resignedly. Completely farkled. He found the strength to look into the dark, laughing eyes. As humiliating as it was, they were infinitely safer than the rest of the aforementioned body. Which was still naked, by the way. He groaned. “Can you at least put your pants on?”

Kyp’s smirk became a full-fledged grin. “Nope. I don’t have any problems with nudity. What, you don’t think you can have a conversation with me without being terminally distracted by my privates?”

A Jedi should be above taking such challenges, but Luke wasn’t up to fulfilling the role of a Master Jedi right now. He even managed a smile, and hoped it wasn’t as weak as he thought it was. “I think I can cope.”

He was rewarded with another flash of the white teeth. “Confidence is everything. In this case, you’re welcome to my dwelling. The water is fine, and I persuaded the only mucous salamander in this lake to stay on the other side.”

“Thanks,” Luke said hastily. “I don’t feel like swimming.” He ignored the sarcastically raised eyebrow. “What were you doing here? Standing so close to the fire should be painful, and I never thought that would be your idea of fun.”

Kyp shook his head. “It’s not painful. A bit uncomfortable, yes, but the aftermath is worth it.”

“Aftermath?”

The young man sighed. “I can’t explain. It’s something that should be felt in order to understand.”

“Is it some sort of a Force technique?”

Kyp rolled his eyes. “How typical of you to ask that. Yes, it is. Isn’t everything?”

Luke laughed quietly. “In one way or another. All right, show me whatever it is.”

“You have to have a swim first.”

“But...”

The last thing Luke’s mind registered before he felt his body flying through the air and hitting the hard surface of the water was Kyp’s exasperated exclamation: “You’re so stubborn!”

By the time he surfaced, gasping for breath, Kyp was already in the water, swimming in circles around him with the easiness and grace of an amphibian. “Hush,” the young man said, laughing. “Save your breath and get out of these clothes. You’ll be much more comfortable.”

That would have been good advice, if Luke wasn’t so infuriated by this outrageous display of manhandling. “What the kriff did you do that for?” he spat at Kyp.

This time the voice that answered him was mildly irritated. “Listen, Master Skywalker, you’re so vapin' distracted you couldn’t even sense what I was up to! What do you think is wrong with you, hmmm?”

A splash, a brief vision of a glistering shoulder and an arm trailing through the water. “You don’t have to answer me,” the invisible mouth said right next to his ear, so close that he felt a puff of warm air reaching him along with the words. “I know. Have been in the same place not so long ago.” Another splash, and Kyp’s face appeared right before the older man’s, indiscernible in the darkness. “Trust your feelings, remember? And if you can’t bring yourself to trust them, or even recognize them, then just trust me.” The sleek hands slid down his body, tugging at the zippers, undoing the fasteners with a practiced touch. “Give up the controls. Forget what you are. You’ll like it, I promise.”

And Luke surrendered. Kyp was right. He was too tired, too frustrated, too plain unhappy to think or analyze. And the only thing he could sense from the younger man was sympathy and an honest desire to help, albeit tinged with a good dose of mischief. Trust your feelings. It was an old mantra which proved to be right time and time again. And right now his feelings were telling him that Kyp, indeed, could help him, if he would only find the strength to put aside his fears and deeply ingrained prissiness. The hands on his body first stilled, then withdrew, waiting for answer, and Luke felt a painful twinge of regret. It really felt good to feel that touch, even through the wet clothes.

“All right,” he whispered finally. “All right.”

Another hot breath warmed the back of his heck between the hairline and the hem of his shirt. This one was so close that he practically felt the warm, moist lips on his skin.

“Good man. Relax, Luke. I’ve got you.”

The hands returned, and this time their touch was sure and firm, almost possessive. They skimmed from his breastbone outward, cupping his pectorals briefly, then moved up to his shoulders and down his hands, taking his shirt with them. In a moment it flew throw the air toward the campfire and Kyp turned to his next task.

“Don’t move your legs,” he warned, before disappearing under the water. Soon Luke felt the strong, agile fingers tugging at his boots, which slid from his feet with a speed that Luke would have thought impossible for soaked footwear, and in a moment both of them appeared on the surface and then proceeded to the same spot as his shirt, at an unhurried pace. The sight of this dignified flight was more than a little bizarre, and Luke couldn’t contain a snicker, which quickly became a gasp, because the same fingers were now sliding up his legs, and their destination was more than clear.

But Kyp managed to surprise him again. His touch was almost impersonal; after the previous not-quite-teasing it was a relief, even if that relief was tinged with disappointment. He knew that if Kyp attempted anything more than just taking off his pants and underwear, he would have been spooked. Wouldn’t he? Suddenly he was very irritated – not at Kyp, but at himself, for being afraid of what his body craved. Was there really a good reason to be afraid?

Kyp’s head surfaced not twenty centimeters from him, and the rest of Luke’s clothes, bundled together, followed the boots in their journey to the beach sand. Suddenly Kyp frowned; the motion of sharp black eyebrows was traceable even in the dark. “You’re thinking again,” he said accusingly. “Stop that. Just feel. Do whatever you want. Say whatever you want. But don’t even try to think.” Luke could practically hear the smirk in the younger man’s voice. “It’s not your strongest side, anyway.”

Luke smiled and lay on his back in the water, moving his legs and arms just enough to stay afloat. “It isn’t, hmmm? Combined with the request to say whatever I want to say... what are you fishing for, Kyp?”

He heard a snort. “Unless that was an invitation for a dirty joke about the particular worm I might use for a bait... it wasn’t, was it?”

“No.”

“Figures. Force forbid you’d really talk about sex, even as a joke. Luke, I don’t need to fish for anything. I can lead anyone on this planet, including you, with a hundred points handicap when it comes to empathy. You can shield your presence from me easier than you can shield your emotions.”

Oh. He knew that Kyp’s empathic abilities were strong – almost all of his abilities were – but if he indeed could read emotions in such detail as his words suggested, and off a trained Jedi Master no less... “All right, why don’t you tell me what I’m feeling now?”

This time he didn’t hear a splash. Kyp’s body vanished under the water without a noise. Luke felt the water moving under his back and the rivulets it created massaged his skin, a barely noticeable tickling, but still a very pleasant sensation.

“You’re missing Callista,” Kyp said matter-of-factly, upon surfacing. “You feel unhappy and lonely, and the treatment people give you wears you down. You’re tired of the respectful distance everyone is keeping, of being a symbol rather than a man. Above everything else, you’re just plain horny. And...” The amusement was back in Kyp’s voice. “If you like the feeling of water moving along your back that much, you could have just asked for it. I’ll still respect you in the morning, don’t worry.”

Luke felt the tiny rivulets starting to move up and down his back. It felt wonderful, and very relaxing, despite the tenseness that settled over his body upon hearing Kyp’s oh-so-accurate assessment. “You said you’d show me something,” he reminded his former student, in order to change the subject.

“Do you feel cleansed yet?” Kyp answered with his own question.

“In which sense?”

“In every sense. That’s the purpose of this. You have to cleanse your body, so nothing will interfere with how your skin is going to absorb the sensations. And you have to clear your mind, in order for you to feel what you’re feeling, and not your perception of what it should be. It’s a pretty simplistic meditation technique. Imagine that water takes all your fears, all the negative feelings and pesky questions inhabiting your mind, and floats them away.”

“I heard about this one,” Luke said languidly. He was already starting to enter the meditative state.

“Undoubtedly,” Kyp answered. “I remember a certain hot pool in a certain grotto, which smells like the definition of a rotten egg. But it’s not about the connection with the Force, Luke. It’s about the connection with your own body. You’re so concerned with everything but yourself that now your body is rebelling on you.”

Luke wondered briefly about the strangeness of hearing things like that from someone just this side of twenty, and his own student to boot. But he couldn’t deny that Kyp was right. On every count. Well, probably it was time for the Master and the student to switch the roles.

He closed his eyes and did his best to follow Kyp’s instructions. The tiny whirlpools helped a lot. They stroked and tickled, but never enough to be irritating. Instead their gentle dance kept Luke focused on sensations rather than emotions, and before long he started to notice that his skin became more sensitive; each touch seemed to be amplified and more defined than before.

“I think I’m ready,” he said quietly.

Kyp hadn’t answered, but he felt that his body started to move through the water, slowly propelled toward the shore. Luke raised his head a bit. To his surprise, he saw that they were pretty far from the campsite, apparently carried away by the currents. “Believe it or not,” he said lazily, feeling just a bit uncomfortable. “I know how to swim.”

Kyp laughed. “If you’d learned how to swim before you learned how to walk, then you could have said that.”

“And you did, of course.”

“Yes. Sometimes I’m really sorry I don’t have gills. But you – for you it’s still not natural. Takes too much concentration and effort. So would you just shut up and let me do the work?” After a couple of minutes of peaceful drifting, he heard: “All right, you can stand up now.”

Luke did. The water was reaching just to his waist. “Now what?”

“Now I’ll explain what I was doing earlier. Come on.” Kyp led the way, and Luke hurried up. Willingly or unwillingly, he had no intentions of checking out Kyp’s backside. He was appreciating his unlabored breathing too much for that.

“It’s all about feeling the extremes,” Kyp said, adding more wood to the fire, which soared up and crackled merrily. “The air here is almost too warm, but it should be sufficient for a novice like you.” He flashed a cocky smile in Luke’s direction. “Ideally, it should be a winter night, and a circle of fires, but we’ll go on with what we have. The trick is to get close enough to feel the heat fully, but not close enough or long enough to burn. Concentrate on your skin, on what it feels, the sensations. Above all else, don’t think. Ready? Let’s begin.”

It took some time to adjust, to find the precise distance at which the heat felt most acute, but didn’t cross the vague line that distinguished it from pain. Kyp was right, it was uncomfortable at first. The heat waves rolled up and down his body, shocking all his nerve endings, evaporating all the moisture from his skin and making it shrink and tighten. And then, suddenly, it came. In a spin of less than a handful of seconds, he felt all the pores in his skin open up. A quiver that he was unable to suppress ran down his body, and a thin film of clean, pleasant smelling sweat appeared on his skin, in a multitude of tiny, glistening droplets. He could feel his skin softening, becoming more sensitive. Every miniscule shift in the heat was perceptible now, and he welcomed each one, caught up in a multitude of nuances he had never expected to feel.

“Enough,” Kyp said softly, distracting him from his discovery. “You’re going to get burned in a minute. Go to the water’s edge and turn to the water.”

The mist-filled darkness wasn’t too much of a distraction, but Luke closed his eyes anyway. Feeling the extremes, Kyp said. In a minute he understood what the younger man meant, when his body was attacked by a multitude of tiny breezes he never knew to be there; just some minutes ago he would have sworn the air was as stale as three-day-old tea. He welcomed each one, accepted their caresses, appreciated the difference between their coldness and the heat he felt just moments ago. Even when the last molecule of sweat dried on his skin under their diligent attention, he still could feel his body tingling, more responsive than it had been in a long time, more alive than... probably, ever.

“Do you understand now?”

He didn’t even heard Kyp coming so close. “Yes. Yes, I do. You’re right; we’re spending so much time focused on the immaterial that we tend to forget how much of our perception is rooted in flesh and bones and nerve endings.”

He heard a quiet chuckle. “And you’re only now starting to get this. We’re not luminous beings, Luke, no matter what Yoda said to you, at least not yet. Forgetting that is just plain foolish.”

“Was that a lesson, Kyp?”

A brief pause, then: “More like a reminder. I’m sure you knew that once. All children do. It’s when we grow up we start to complicate things... sometimes unnecessarily.”

Luke sighed. “I’m not sure we’ve had anything to appreciate on Tatooine. Scorching heat during the day, scorching cold during the night. To get naked anywhere outdoors meant a painful death most of the time. The first time I used water for anything but drinking was here, on Yavin IV. I was just a bit younger than you are now.” He flinched. “If I never see sand again it will be too soon. Of course, you’ve had it even worse growing up...”

“On Kessel, yes,” Kyp answered. “But living on Deyer was great. I think that if I wasn’t raised on Deyer, I would have never survived Kessel.”

“What was it like?”

“Pleasant,” Kyp answered, a little dreamily. “We didn’t have much in terms of luxuries, but we had everything that was needed for a healthy life. A very mild climate – actually, the temperature was pretty constant around the year. Lots and lots of water. We were spending almost all our lives swimming or diving, and most of the time clothes weren’t something to be bothered with. A lot of healthy food, even if it tasted a bit bland. I remember my parents saying that they’d chosen a good planet to raise their children on.”

“They weren’t from Deyer?”

“No. They settled there when Zeth was just a couple months old. I’m pretty sure Mom was Corellian; her accent was very much like Han’s, and she spoke Corellian fluently. But they didn’t talk about their lives before Deyer.”

Luke smirked. Corellian blood. That explained a lot.

“We’re wasting time,” Kyp said suddenly. The wistfulness was gone from his voice and a familiar brittle edge settled in its place. Luke understood. The Deyer Kyp had been remembering was gone now, utterly destroyed by the Empire. He had seen the pictures – ruined cities on decaying rafts, poisoned, foul, lifeless waters. He didn’t have any doubt that Kyp saw them too. And he didn’t have to be a Jedi Master to feel his pain.

“Let’s do it again,” Kyp said more steadily. “Two times should be just about right for you.”

“And you?”

“I’d done it twice before you arrived. Front and back. It’s not recommended to do more than four times in a row.”

The second time was even better than the first. This time Luke knew what to expect, and did his best to get the most out of the experience. Although he still couldn’t discern the moment when the heat was becoming dangerous; Kyp had to send him back again, and Luke didn’t protest, accepting his superior knowledge in the matter.

Afterwards, they took another dip in the lake, much shorter than the first one. Kyp’s sullen pout was visible even in darkness, and Luke was starting to regret reminding the younger man about the life he had lost. He only hoped it wouldn’t take long to snap his student out of his brooding spell; Kyp was famous for his quick mood swings.

“So, where did you learn to do this?” Luke asked, while spreading his damp clothes around the fire. The answer Kyp gave him, though, made him drop one of the boots he was holding right on his own foot.

“On Dathomir,” Kyp answered simply. Sensing Luke’s pang of surprise, he turned. “What? I understand you were a bit preoccupied when you were there, but it’s a great place, and the Sisters have a lot to teach...”

“How, in the name of all that's holy and unholy, did you end up on Dathomir?” exclaimed Luke.

Kyp looked at him from his crouched position and blew the drying wavy bangs away from his eyes. “The usual way. Through hyperspace jumps.”

“But why?”

The youngster extracted a couple of plasticrates and a military-issue sleeping bag from his backpack. “It’s a long story,” he answered, unzipping the bag and spreading it near the diminishing fire.

Luke considered his tone. Kyp rarely, if ever, initiated any divulging of his personal information. Usually one had to ask, prod, and cajole him into it, and if Kyp was willing, he would let himself be persuaded. Right now, it didn’t seem to be the ‘it’s a long story, so let’s close the subject’ tone. Rather it was ‘it’s a long story, but I can tell it if you’re willing to listen’. And right now, Luke was willing.

“Well, it seems that we have time. I don’t want to sleep yet. Do you?”

Kyp shook his head. “No. I slept about twenty hours in the hyperspace coming here.”

“When did you get in, by the way?”

“About eight hours ago. Cilghal knows I’m here; I asked her not to tell anyone else.”

That was interesting. The last supply charter was two days ago, and no other ship had visited them in the meantime. So Kyp had some hyperspace-capable hunk of junk in his possession, and Luke highly doubted he had found it on Dathomir.

Finished with his clothes, he turned to ask Kyp about his ship, and froze in place.

Kyp was on his knees on the spread, untying and unbraiding his hair. The pose was eerily similar to the one that had sent Luke reeling the first time around, and the effect it had on him proved to be stunningly, achingly the same. If anything, it was worse. He had never thought he could become so fully, painfully hard in such a short time; all of his body, each so recently rejuvenated nerve ending, every molecule of his skin was screaming at him to kneel down behind this young, perfect body, feel it, skin on skin, sink his teeth into that rounded, bulging muscle on Kyp’s shoulder. Slide his hands over that flat, rippling abdomen and make certain that the feel of the taut muscles under the smooth skin was, indeed, as wonderful as he imagined it to be.

Luke never heard the moan that escaped his lips. He didn’t hear anything at all. All sounds were drowned in the abnormally loud beating of his own pulse in his ears. All parts of his consciousness that weren’t consumed by this voracious lust were devoted to one simple task: staying still. Staying still and not moving. Kyp was his student, damn it, a male one at that, and to think of him in that way was just plain impossible. Forbidden. He shouldn’t...

He never had an opportunity to finish that thought. Warm, rough hands settled on his upper arms and tugged him forward, and suddenly he smelled the fresh, watered scent barely tinged with a faint, almost imperceptible whiff of musk; felt the hot smoothness over the hard planes of chest muscles, and a groove between the curve of a bone he had admired earlier and the shockingly unfamiliar bulge of another male's genitals that fit his aching erection so perfectly, so completely...

An ion blast would have been less devastating.

“Hang on,” he heard dimly. “Just hang on, Luke. Trust me.”

And, as if those two words were a spell specially designed to break his resolve, Luke gave himself to the abyss. His trembling hands were everywhere on Kyp’s body, stroking, grasping, and scratching in a doomed attempt to get enough – enough sensation, enough of this momentary ownership to satisfy the beast of gluttony he became. He felt a hand settling over one of his buttocks, pulling him close, initiating the first, hard, painful, perfect thrust, and after that the notion of slowing down ceased to exist. He drove into the channel between their bodies at fervent speed, not bothering with any control or finesse, mindless of his partner's pleasure or lack thereof. He didn’t feel his legs; for that matter, he had no idea where his hands were now. It didn’t matter. Kyp would hold him. Kyp would not let him fall.

It still wasn’t enough. The climb to completion seemed endless, and Luke was sobbing in despair. There was no turning back; he had to travel this road to rapture to the last step or die, die here and now, separated from the ultimate satisfaction by barely a hairbreadth.

Suddenly a strong hand encircled his waist and Luke felt himself to be lifted, but, thankfully, not estranged. He wouldn’t have been able to bear any kind of separation right now, even a momentary one. A hard thigh insinuated itself between his legs, spreading them a bit, just enough to provide another point of support. It changed the angle of his thrusts, putting more pressure on the most sensitive, precise spot under the head, and Luke exhaled in a rush, forgetting to inhale, not knowing if any sound had left his throat along with the air.

In the next second nails raked down his back from the neck to the buttocks, making him spasm in the strongest, most oblivious surge of all, suspended on the edge where acuteness transformed to pain. The road was traveled; the doors opened, and the world ceased to exist.

When the universe reassembled itself around him, it was dark. It was a comfortable darkness, as nourishing and familiar on some primitive, essential level, as a mother’s womb, only bigger. He drifted, lax and satiated, in a state of half-awareness, wrapped in wet warmth. Time didn’t matter. Place didn’t matter. Nothing mattered but the fact that he felt good. Finally. Finally.

“Do you feel like walking yet?” asked a soft voice from somewhere very close, and the reality finished stabilizing. He was in the lake, drifting slowly, supported by an invisible touch – by Kyp. Kyp...

Shame brought warmth to his cheeks. How could he... How...

Luke struggled against the Force support, eager to stand on his own legs. The hold withdrew immediately. He heard a chuckle. “I never before had someone faint just from humping me. It’s quite flattering. Sorry if I spoiled your afterglow, but I don’t have a towel and come is vapin' hard to wash from the clothes.”

He didn’t answer. In this moment, he would have given up sex for years in exchange for the possibility of finding himself in his own room, remembering a weird dream in which he dry-humped his own student, a boy almost fifteen years his junior. Even as a dream, it would have been hard to stomach. As a reality it was absolutely unbearable.

“Luke?” he heard Kyp’s suddenly hesitant exclamation behind. And then a sudden yell: “Don’t you dare to turn your back on me, Skywalker! I sure as kriff don’t deserve that!”

Luke felt the hot, caustic tears gather in his eyes. Kyp was right. First he took his pleasure with him, not even bothering to reciprocate, and now he was turning his back on the younger man, giving him the impression that he was disgusted with him, when, in fact, the disgust he felt was directed at himself. Looking into Kyp’s furious face was probably one of the hardest things Luke had to do in his life, but he made himself do it.

“I’m sorry,” he said quietly. “It’s not your fault, I know. It’s mine.”

The outrage on Kyp’s face, barely perceptible in the dark, turned to irritation. “Oh, I got it. The obligatory Skywalker brood. Everything is your fault, isn’t it? Even if it’s something as natural and pleasurable as sex. Even when I bloody well initiated it! Thank you so much, Skywalker. That really shows your opinion of me.”

Now Luke was confused as well as ashamed. “What do you mean? I don’t think any less of you because of that.”

“Yes?” Kyp asked sarcastically. “Then you either have a very strange way of showing it, or you have a really low opinion of me. Which one it is?”

“Neither. I don’t understand what you’re talking about. I did something I shouldn’t have done. What do you have to do with it?”

Something softened almost imperceptibly in Kyp’s angular face. “Oh my,” he said with a sigh. “And I thought my head was messed up. All right, I’ll explain. But I’m going to do it there,” he nodded to the campsite, “where you can see my eyes and I can see yours. And you can very well stop acting like your opinion is the only truth in the world and listen for a change.”

Even numb as he had been, Luke was still stung by Kyp’s words. Was he really that oblivious to someone else’s opinion, that unwilling to listen? He had never thought that of himself, but Kyp, obviously, was quite honest when saying that. He sighed. Listening to what Kyp had to say was the least he could do for the younger man. And probably, just probably, Kyp could provide something that would make the situation a little more tolerable. It was worth a try.

Kyp led the way back to the shore, and immediately started to re-kindle the diminishing fire. Luke just stood there, with his eyes down, afraid to look at him, afraid that even a casual glance would re-ignite that unbearable lust he was so helpless against.

“Sit, for Force’s sake,” Kyp said with barely leashed irritation. “Stop standing there like the epitome of guilt. There is nothing to feel guilty about.”

Luke sat down, but it failed to make Kyp happy. “On the spread, please. I don’t want you to be distracted from what I’m going to say by a bug that might crawl up your arse.”

The picture made Luke flush, and even in his current state of mind he couldn’t contain a small smile. He moved to the spread and sat there, hugging his knees tightly.

“Better,” observed Kyp. “You know, sometimes I really feel like mind-whamming you – probably it would take care of that piece of duracrete that got installed in your brain at some distant point in your past.”

Luke raised an eyebrow. “You think you can?”

The only answer he got was a crooked and very self-assured smile. Then Kyp flopped down on the cloth a bare meter from him and got comfortable. He tucked one leg under himself and bent the other one at the knee, resting his intertwined hands and his chin on it.

“All right,” he said. “Let’s take care of the basics. First of all, I’m not a child. Agreed?”

“Well, yes, of course, but...”

“No buts. I’m not. It doesn’t matter that I’m thirteen years younger than you. I’m twenty, and I’m an adult by any galactic standard set for humans. Yes or no?”

“All right. Yes.”

“Then do you agree that I’m fully capable of making my own choices?”

“Yes.”

“So what in nine Corellian hells is your problem then? You didn’t seduce me, you didn’t coerce me, and you didn’t force me. So what are you so mortified about?”

“I’m your teacher, Kyp!” exclaimed Luke.

“Aaaaand? Oh, I get it. You think I did that out of respect? A funny way to show respect, if you ask me. By the way,” Kyp lashed out at him angrily, “I thought I’d shown you my definition of respect. Remember?”

Luke didn’t need to specify what the younger man was referring to. “That was long ago, Kyp. You were different then,” he answered, proud of the calmness in his voice. Anything that just happened between them notwithstanding, he wasn’t going to let Kyp drive him to anger and exchange of insults.

Apparently, it worked, because Kyp lowered his eyes momentarily, and when he answered, his voice was gentler. “Yes. But still – if you think I might have sex with anybody out of respect or duty – you obviously don’t know me all that well. Anyway, I can assure you it’s not the case. I know the effect I have on people, and I learned years ago how to avoid the encounters I don’t want. What?” he asked, noticing the look in Luke’s eyes. “You thought you’re the only one having a bad case of hots for my body? Sorry to disappoint, then. Very few are immune, actually.”

Kyp’s eyes became distant and unfocused for a moment. “It’s just the way it is,” he said with a bitter undertone. “You at least are being honest about it. Some others are so afraid of their attraction that they react with aggression... now that’s unpleasant.”

“Unpleasant?” echoed Luke, who started to lose the thread of this conversation.

“Hell, yeah! They are so scared of what they feel that they just have to prove to themselves and anyone else that they can’t, shouldn’t, and won’t feel it. Usually it means that I have to become an evil incarnate – at least in their mind. Like with this insufferable prick Halcion. Sometimes I think that if he wasn’t provoking me at every other step back then...” Kyp cut himself off suddenly and shook his head, as if trying to get rid of an unwanted thought. “Never mind. Sorry, I got carried away.”

Now, that was something Luke didn’t expect to hear. If Kyp was right – and Luke had a sinking suspicion that he was – it put a very different spin on Corran Horn’s attitude during that mess with Kyp and Exar Kun that had occurred four years ago, and it definitely deserved further investigation. But not right now. Luke suddenly realized that he wasn’t feeling quite as bad as before. Kyp’s logical, matter-of-fact approach allowed him to gain some perspective. Indeed, his automatic thinking of the younger man as a kid was very unjustified, albeit natural. He still hadn’t quite managed to shake off his first impression of Kyp as a wide-eyed, underfed, and under-loved teenager, and that fact was just forcibly brought home to him. And yes, Kyp wasn’t the sort that would have let himself be used by a teacher figure – he had learned the lesson the hard way, and learned it well.

“Luke,” Kyp said quietly, with a strange note of hesitation and an undertone of pain in his voice. “I asked you to trust me, and you did. Do you really regret it now?”

A shiver ran down Luke’s spine. Something was telling him that that was the heart of the issue, something more serious than anything Kyp had said prior to that. Trust. He knew his student; probably less than he would have liked to, but he did. Trust was something Kyp Durron valued very much, and in recent years he went out of his way to prove that he, indeed, deserved to be trusted. And no matter the cynical quips Kyp might have uttered in his address, Luke knew that he was one out of the very small group of people that Kyp allowed himself to trust, despite his secretive nature and standoffish reflexes instilled during the years he had spent on Kessel.

To break this trust now, over something as insignificant in comparison as his sense of propriety, would be a disaster. Yes, he still felt uneasy about the whole thing, but did he regret it now, after everything Kyp had said? Luke searched himself, hard. Yes, he still did; however, the reasons for that were starting to look more than a bit different now.

“No,” he said firmly after all. “No, I don’t regret trusting you. I’m sorry, Kyp. You... spooked me, badly, and I overreacted. My apologies.”

A dark-skinned, long-fingered hand stretched toward him and Luke couldn’t suppress a shudder when the callused fingers stroked his arm from the wrist up, ruffling the small hair and leaving goose bumps in their wake. “Spooked... scared, rather, I’d say. What scares you so much about sex, Luke?”

“It doesn’t...”

“Uh-huh. Right. That’s why you are sitting in the most closed position possible, because you’re not scared. Right. You forgot that I can sense you. What is it, Skywalker?”

“Damn it, Kyp!” exploded Luke, Kyp’s intrusion being suddenly more than he could tolerate. “Who appointed you to be my psychologist?”

Kyp, startled, looked at him with narrowed eyes. “Who appointed me? Let’s see. You had the whole moon at your disposal, and yet, out of all the places you could have headed for, you ended up here, with me. Why do you think it happened, o great Jedi Master?” he asked sarcastically.

The implication behind Kyp’s words didn’t register for some time, but when it did, it hit Luke hard. “You think it’s the Force that brought me to you?”

“I think it’d be too much of a coincidence otherwise. Yavin IV is a pretty big place.”

“Probably,” Luke whispered. “Probably.”

Kyp didn’t say anything more, as if he wanted to let the idea put roots in Luke’s mind. And put in roots it did; actually, Luke realized that only the extreme bizarreness of the whole situation precluded him from reaching the same conclusion. Coincidences happened, of course; however, this situation felt anything but. Probably he should trust Kyp to the end and allow him to flesh out whatever issues he was having lately, since, truth to be told, the fact that he was having them was becoming too obvious to ignore. Luke smiled bitterly. Kyp Durron as a psychologist and sex therapist. For him. If there were better jokes in the world, he was unable to come up with one right now.

If Kyp was a sex therapist, he sure preferred the hands-on approach, Luke thought muzzily, when he felt the now-familiar hands tugging at his interlocked fingers. He raised his eyes. Kyp had changed position – he was on his knees now, with legs splayed slightly, and the wavy black hair, dry now, was falling all over his wide shoulders. There was a focused intensity in his fine-boned, handsome face, something that spoke of a decision made, or an intention realized. Luke almost groaned aloud. Lust spiked in him again, with the insistence of a spear being run through his intestines, but this time he was able to control it. Barely.

“Stop that!” Kyp hissed at him. “I want you, you dumb fool! Can you just vapin' let it happen?” He pried Luke’s fingers apart and ran his hands over Luke’s knees and down his tightly closed thighs, the tips of the fingers skimming along the seam between them, where the skin was most tender and sensitive. Luke shuddered. “Stop thinking with your head. Give your body a chance.” The seductive, insistent whisper began to melt Luke’s resolve, and of course, Kyp sensed that immediately. One more push, even more resolute than the previous one, and Luke’s legs fell open, and Kyp moved even closer with a wordless exclamation of victory, insinuating himself between Luke’s parted thighs. “Give me a chance,” he pleaded fervently. “You don’t know what a rush it was, feeling you being gone on me like that! Because of me, because you wanted me so much you couldn’t think of anything else, because nothing existed for you in the world but me. I want to feel it again, Luke. Stop fighting it, dammit!” And then, the last, almost desperate word: “Please...”

He might have withstood the seduction of Kyp’s young, perfect body. He might have been able to disregard the assurances of his willingness. But hearing Kyp beg for it was impossible to ignore. Some deep instinct, some essential, core part of his personality wouldn’t allow him to brush it off, and this part was much stronger than all his misgivings and Tatooine-bred notions of decency. Luke’s hands circled Kyp’s rib cage of their own accord, and his wordless groan merged with the younger man’s triumphant ‘yes!’ in what seemed at the moment to be perfect harmony. Luke bit down at the juncture between Kyp’s long, strong neck and his shoulder, and with the taste of it, the spicy, salt-tinged, warm taste, a new, unfamiliar feeling descended on him.

It wasn’t love. It was, probably, something even more profound in a way. It was freedom, as heady and potent as the moment of submitting to the Dark Side had been, but without the taint of malevolence. It was a freedom to feel and to touch, to pleasure and be pleasured, to dominate and submit at the same time, to lay everything he was in this moment on the other man and have him do the same.

“Again,” panted Kyp. “Do it again, and don’t you dare to get tender and considerate on me – I’ll vapin' kill you!” And Luke obliged, happily, savagely, stroking, kissing, scratching and grasping, feeling the hard muscles shift fluidly under his hands, marking the soft skin with hickeys, tooth marks, and scratches. This time he retained just enough awareness to fully feel what he was doing, and enjoy it.

Oh, how did he enjoy it! Nothing in his life had felt like that; no previous encounters were able to prepare him for this intensity. And this time it was even better than the first, because he could feel Kyp respond, feel him right along, matching him kiss for kiss and bite for bite. They existed in a universe made just for the two of them, feeding off each other’s exhilaration through a kind of a Force loop, taking each other higher and higher.

Somewhere along this wild ride Kyp seized both their shafts in his hand, pumping them both with powerful, measured motions, but that was not enough, he wasn’t able to generate the right pressure, and Luke pushed him on his back, falling on top of him and capturing both erections, together with the encircling hand, between them. Oh, that was so much better! And better still when he felt one of Kyp’s legs wrapping around his thighs, urging him closer than close, adding to his thrusts, dictating a rhythm that, seemingly, could have been felt on the other side of the moon.

This time it was Kyp who first reached completion. Mesmerized, Luke watched the avid green eyes opening wide with the expression of startled wonder in them, and the opened mouth rounding in a surprisingly quiet ‘ahhhh’. His body became rigid, and the penis that was so close to Luke’s own that it felt almost like one erection instead of two, started to jerk in unmistakable spasms that heralded climax. Luke was so engrossed in this display that when the contractions stopped and Kyp’s eyes closed, and his whole body became lax, it came as a surprise. But as soon as it happened, Luke was reminded of his own, rather insistent need. Fortunately, Kyp’s grip was still anything but lax, and the slick sperm that spilled on his fingers and their bellies made everything much easier. Luke thrust hard against Kyp’s slightly softened shaft, and the younger man’s eyes flew open. They were unfocused and filled with tears.

“Closer,” he whispered. “Come closer.” And as soon as Luke obeyed, shifting forward, Kyp’s second hand found its way between their bodies, and wrapped around Luke’s member as well, creating a tight, wonderful channel for him to fuck himself into, sleek enough not to impede, but rough enough to maintain the acuteness of the sensation Luke craved. He propped himself on his hands and closed his eyes, taking the picture of Kyp’s face in a state that could only be called a static rapture, into the darkness with him. It was over for him as well, in only five thrusts, and he froze, shuddering with the power of his climax, calling out Kyp’s name in an endless litany of gratitude.

And when it was over, he bent down, trailing his fingers through that thick curly mane that had been his downfall, winding the black strands around his fingers, still panting from the exertion, and listening to the stream of outrageous obscenities in at least five different languages Kyp was whispering while tossing his head from side to side as much as Luke’s grip on his hair allowed. At the moment they sounded like the nicest of endearments.

Neither of them was up to thinking of practicalities. The only reasonable thing Luke was still capable of, after both of them found themselves halfway back to earth, was shifting back just a bit and falling asleep with his head on Kyp’s chest, one strand of the black hair still clutched between his fingers. Kyp didn’t complain; in fact, he was asleep even before Luke.

Of course, sleep in those circumstances couldn’t last long. The sensation of being glued to something woke him up at the first serious attempt to shift position. Luke wrinkled his nose at the smell and thought that Kyp had been absolutely right – washing up was going to be a chore.

“Disgusting, isn’t it?” he heard a languid comment from below.

“Quite.”

“At least you don’t have it all over your hands. This bag is going to smell like a whorehouse for weeks.” Despite the complaining nature of the comment, Kyp’s voice was way too content and amused for Luke to take it seriously.

“How about a wash then?”

“Can’t,” Kyp answered just as lazily. “Feels too good to move.”

Luke shared the sentiment fully, but thought that needs must. He rose slowly, wincing at the sensation that came with separation, so similar to ripping off a tape bandage. “Up you go,” he commanded the younger man.

Kyp didn’t move a muscle. “Frip off,” he mumbled in a response. “I’m going to die dirty, but happy.”

Luke rolled his eyes. “I warned you,” he said, and, before Kyp could comprehend what that meant, he proved to his former student that he was also no slouch in the telekinetic department.

Kyp’s body hit the water like a stone, and disappeared just as quickly. But when Kyp hadn’t surfaced in the next ten seconds, Luke started to worry. Another five seconds. Nothing.

He ran into the lake in a hurry, and stopped when the water came to his shoulders. Now what? If something happened... he had to dive... find the body. Where? He stretched out with the Force, trying to locate the younger man, who proved to be much closer than he thought.

In the next moment Luke’s legs were snatched out from under him, and he fell in the water, which immediately covered his head. As soon as he surfaced, he was hit in the face by a continuous stream of droplets coming from under the younger man’s hands.

He heard Kyp’s victorious yell. “H-hhha! Catch me if you can!” And with that, Kyp disappeared again.

Luke, though, knew better than to play ‘catch me if you can’ in the water with a far superior swimmer. He just lay on the surface, scissoring his legs idly and scrubbing the half-dried come from his chest and other places. Every touch felt like a caress, pleasant and indulging, but the urgent frenzy of lust was gone, leaving behind a deep, unfamiliar satisfaction. And, amazingly, no regrets. Not a single one.

Kyp’s head broke the water surface a meter from him. “Not fair,” he said sullenly, throwing his hair off his face.

“Life isn’t fair,” Luke answered mildly. “Are you surprised?”

He heard a snort, and then, after a pause: “How do you feel?” There was a note of anxiety in Kyp’s voice, and Luke felt a pang of pain. He had really hurt the younger man with his previous behavior, and for what? In this moment he couldn’t for the life of him comprehend what his previous angst was all about.

“You tell me,” he said lazily. “You’re the uber-empath here.”

Another snort. “Feels good to let your body take command for a change, doesn’t it?”

“It was more than that and you know it.”

“Of course. But that’s the basic idea.” Kyp drifted beside him for a moment, then spoke again. “Let’s go back. I’m so hungry I could eat a dewback while riding it.”

“Shouldn’t we put more wood on it?” Luke asked on the shore, looking at dark red embers of the fire.

“Oh no,” Kyp answered. “Later, probably. It’s right where I want it to be for this.” He pulled one of the plasticrates Luke had completely forgotten about, and started to bury its contents – the medium-sized, purplish tubers very similar to the desert plums native to Tatooine – in the coals one by one. “They should be ready soon,” he said, opening the second crate and taking out something that Luke presumed to be a fresh eel, skinned, gutted, and cut into pieces. On the other hand, it could just as well be a snake. He wouldn’t put it past Kyp.

“Tell me it’s what I hope it is,” he told the young man. “Lie if you have to.”

That lame joke won him a brilliant smile, but no answer. Kyp started to thread the pieces on a skewer one by one. Luke sighed and decided that he probably could eat a snake – he had eaten gorgs, for Force’s sake! Kyp was amazingly well-prepared and methodical, starting from how his camp was set up and ending with the carefully prepped and sealed food. And Luke was pretty sure that, unlike him, Kyp hadn’t taken any military survival courses. Of course, with the amount of time Kyp was spending in the jungles...

It seemed that he really didn’t know a lot about his student, he admitted with a sigh. Kyp had managed to surprise him at every step this night. Come to think about surprises, there was something he had wanted to ask the young man before they got... distracted.

“So what were you doing on Dathomir?”

Kyp turned his improvised spit and sighed. “A long story, just as I said. Remember that mission to Argovia you sent me on?”

Of course Luke remembered. It had seemed to be a fairly straightforward and simple diplomatic mission at the time – two wealthy mining corporations requested a neutral and unbribable mediator for what they called business negotiations. Luke had thought it would be a good experience for Kyp. His choice, thought, had proved to be much more apt than he ever suspected when the ‘business negotiations’ revealed themselves to be a tiff between two huge shadow structures that supported those corporations.

Kyp’s Kessel background had come in very handy; Luke thought the mission was a stunning success at the very least, because Kyp had managed to get the conflict settled without bloodshed. However, it had been, apparently, unpleasant enough that Kyp requested some leave time after that, which Luke granted. That had been a good nine standard months ago, and no one had seen Kyp nor heard from him since, until today.

“I met a girl when I was there,” Kyp started slowly. “Don’t laugh, it was almost like some romance writer thought it up. She nearly got run over by a speeder while crossing the street. I yanked her from under it at the last possible moment. Then I left – I was in a hurry. I thought she wouldn’t notice who did it, or wouldn’t remember because of the shock, but I underestimated her. She remembered. Two days later, her father paid me a visit, thanked me, and invited me to a family dinner. I tried to say it was unnecessary, but he wasn’t going to accept my refusal.” Kyp smiled bleakly. “He is a pretty insistent man. I was almost finished there, so I thought it wouldn’t hurt if I had a bit of fun before heading back. I hadn’t been invited to a family dinner since Deyer.

“I hadn’t told him who I was, though. I said I’m a Jedi and my name is Zeth. Imagine my surprise when at that dinner my persona became the main topic for conversation. I mean, they were interested in Kyp Durron. They showered me – as ‘Zeth’ – with a thousand questions. What kind of a man is Kyp Durron? What does he look like? Are the others treating him kindly? Does he need something he might not be able to provide? I couldn’t understand it at first – I thought it’s just a sick curiosity, but they seemed to be very genuinely interested in my well-being. So I asked them outright – believe me, I was starting to get really uncomfortable.”

Kyp rotated the spit again and looked at Luke askance. “Luke, did you know that there are a number of people whose opinion on what I did back then is, so to speak... quite different from the official one?”

Luke sighed. “Yes, I know. I never told you that before, and probably I should have, but I called Mon Mothma very soon after the defeat of Exar Kun. She told me that they’d gotten a message from Han about your surrender and I asked her what they were going to do with you. I was fully prepared to beg her for your life – if you surrendered that meant you had got through the Dark Side, or at least started to, and that was all that mattered to me. I pointed out that your situation was not all that dissimilar to mine, after I served the Emperor Reborn.

"She said that I could save my breath. Apparently, they conducted some polls quietly – and found out that your actions had enough support even on Coruscant to create a huge political issue if they so much as gave you a prison sentence, not to mention an execution. And on some other planets votes were even more in your favor. Alderaanian remnant, for example, voted for you almost eighty percent against twenty. So, she said, they were going to give you a good scare and then send you back here. I was so relieved that I agreed immediately.

"That was probably my mistake. Han told me later about that trial they gave you, and I thought that was very much over the top. But what was done was done, and arguing about it after the fact seemed to be pointless. Besides, I really thought you should have taken responsibility for your actions, and even if I didn’t like the implementation, the idea itself was sound.”

“Do you know,” Kyp asked angrily, “what I would have given to know that four years ago?”

“I didn’t think it was good for you to know four years ago, Kyp,” Luke answered quietly.

“Oh, yes? And spending two years battling with suicidal ideations because I thought the entire galaxy hated me was so much better! Fuck you!”

Luke just cocked his head to the side and looked at Kyp with a smile, waiting for the credit to drop. Fortunately, Kyp probably was feeling as much at peace at the moment as Luke was, because his outrage didn’t last long. The sense of humor resurfaced, and Kyp wasn’t able to contain a snicker.

“All right. It was a bad choice of words. But still – don’t you think that’s something I had the right to know?”

“Well, you know now. Probably it’s the right time for you to know. But what has it to do with the girl you mentioned?”

“Well, speaking of the Alderaanian Remnant. Her father was from Alderaan, and the only reason the family survived was that they were visiting her mother’s relatives on Argovia at the time of the big boom. Her mother’s family had lost all their wealth when the Empire nationalized the mines on Argovia, and they suffered long years of desperate poverty because of that. As you can imagine, their feelings toward the Empire were less than kind. So when I asked them, I got the full explanation, at length, about what they think of my actions, what they think of the New Republic’s government’s attitude toward me, and what a damn shame it is that I wasn’t regarded as a hero instead of being smeared all over the holoscreens as a mass murderer.

"To say I was shocked would be to say nothing. I tried to explain, but they weren’t buying a sliv of it. It was so fripping paradoxical – I was acting as my own prosecutor, and they were defending me to me – that in the end I practically yelled at them that I am Kyp Durron, shavit, and I should bloody well know better what I did and why I did it!”

Luke imagined that scene and burst out laughing. Kyp’s lips also stretched out in a reluctant smile. “It didn’t seem quite as funny at the time.”

“I imagine they threw you out as an impostor after that?” Luke asked, wiping the tears from his eyes.

“Almost. Fortunately, I had my identification card with me, and a holocube that had a holo of me with Han and the twins – and I was irritated enough to show them to prove my point. After the dust settled I got a standing invitation to come by whenever I wanted, to eat, to live, or just to talk, up to me. We... actually we talked a lot after that. They calmed down, I calmed down... it was a very good evening, all in all.

"So I came the next day, too, and that’s when I started to notice Vallerra, the girl I saved. She was kind of quiet the previous day, but when I came back she started to open up. To make a long story short, I spent a week all but living in their household, leaving only for the negotiations. By the end of that week the idea of spending another one – or a dozen – started to appear really good. I... I felt like a part of a family, Luke. I didn’t even know I missed it so much. I thought I fell in love with Vallerra.”

“You thought?”

Kyp shrugged. “Certainly felt like that. I don’t have a lot to compare to, mind you. I wanted her. She was a lot like Leia, appearance-wise. Dark hair, dark eyes, petite, but with a figure to die for. And she just had that look on her face, you know, like she knew something about life I didn’t, and never would. I liked her – very much so. She was reserved, quiet, but you could see that there was a fire underneath. I felt different with her. Calmer, less troubled. She had a wicked sense of humor and she never was shy about using it, at least after the first couple of days. I had my head so much in the clouds that I don’t even remember who first began to speak about an engagement. Probably me.”

“So what happened?”

“A difference in perspective, that’s what happened. They had absolutely nothing against taking me, Kyp Durron, into their family. My fame was an issue with me, but not with them. They said it’s pretty customary on Argovia for a husband to take his wife’s family name, if her family was better known or better established than his. I could have just done that, and, look, now you see me, now you don’t. How many Kyps are in this galaxy? What a fripping irony – I wanted so much to be taken for what I am, not for what I do, or did, but when it happened, it just didn’t work out.”

Luke had a sneaking suspicion that he knew what Kyp was talking about, but still asked, just to be sure. “What do you mean?”

Kyp sighed, took the skewer off the fire and began to dig out the baked tubers, placing them on the sturdy, big leaves. “Vallerra very much knew what she wanted from life. And being a Jedi’s wife just didn’t fit in. She wanted to continue her father’s business, and to have kids who would continue it after her, and have a secure, stable life... do I need to go further? They told me outright that I would have to quit being a Jedi if I wanted to marry her. I tried to explain how important it is to me, but they just didn’t understand. From their point of view, I allowed myself to be guilt-tripped into a lifelong servitude. ‘But you don’t even like being a Jedi,’ they said...”

“And why would they think that?”

Kyp colored slightly while handing him his share of food. “I was very irritated with this mission, and got a little carried away while voicing it. Anyway, it’s not about liking, and that’s something I wasn’t able to explain. I still can’t. I just feel that it’s vital for me, that I can’t live any other way, but explaining that...” Kyp shrugged eloquently and tore open one of the tubers, then carefully started to eat the crumbly, purplish pink steaming pulp. “I tried their way, though. Dohar took me to the mines.” Kyp visibly shuddered. “And to the business meetings, claiming me as his advisor. I was, in a sense. I told him which of his business partners was lying, or hiding something, or the other way around, which was being completely honest, and he was able to avoid a couple of traps and strike quite a few successful bargains because of that. He was ecstatic about that, but it only served to reinforce their determination that I should make a choice, because, as he put it, you can’t be a part-time businessman.

"I told him that you can’t be a part-time Jedi, either. For some reason I felt like a cheater when I eventually told them I couldn’t do it and that I had to leave before it became way too painful for all of us. That was the hardest part, Luke. I really liked them, and they liked me. I loved Vallerra, I truly did. Probably it wasn’t a grand passion, but I think I could have easily lived all my life with her, and she clearly felt the same way about me. And still there was no way it would have worked out.”

Kyp suddenly froze with the piece of meat halfway to his mouth. “You know,” he said thoughtfully, “I think it was a lot like you and Callista. We never liked each other, she and I, but I can understand why she did what she did.”

Luke nodded. Actually, he had thought the same thing, just before Kyp voiced the idea. “I imagine they weren’t thrilled by your decision?”

“No, of course not. I wasn’t thrilled by my decision, Luke. But we parted on good terms. They said I’m still welcome in their home, as a friend, if nothing else. At least that’s a relief. I’m so glad they are not angry with me. It still smarts, I expect it will for quite a while, but it could have been worse.”

Luke agreed wholeheartedly, if silently. His own wound still bled after two years; and he didn’t expect it to get much better any time soon.

“So how did you get from Argovia to Dathomir? And why, in the name of both Tatooine’s suns?”

Kyp looked at him with a slight smile. “You don’t have good memories about that place, do you?”

Luke shrugged. “A few. But, overall, it wasn’t pleasant.”

“Well, I’d suggest you try it out again. You might like it now. They relaxed their, ahem, mating rituals a bit, at least where male-witches are concerned. And, like I said, you can learn a lot there, if you ask nicely enough.”

“So it wasn’t an accident? You went there on purpose?”

“Yes. Did you know that I had an affair with Kirana Ti some time ago?”

“I suspected that. You two were very close after that adventure on Corbos. It was almost palpable.”

“She thought I saved her life during that mess. I think it was rather a trade-off, since she also saved mine, but she admitted she started to look at me differently after that. They have this thing about a man saving a woman’s life, you know? Seems to be pretty important for them, one of the few actions that allow them to start thinking of a man as their equal.”

“I know,” smiled Luke. “For me it was the other way around – Teneniel Djo let me out of our ‘engagement’ after I saved her life.”

“I say you shouldn’t have let her. You don’t know what you have missed, believe me.”

Luke flushed at the suggestive tone in Kyp’s voice. “So that was what you were after? Sex?”

“Along with everything else. My sexual life definitely could have stood to be improved back then. I was in pretty much the same shape that you were when you came here tonight. Frustrated, disappointed, and very miserable. Kirana suggested long ago that I should go there – I was very interested in some things she showed me, but she said that the other, older, witches could teach me much more. She even composed a message to her clan for me. I just hadn’t gotten around to do that. And then I left Argovia and it seemed like just the thing to do.”

“Finding a ship that would be willing to drop you off there was probably a chore,” Luke noticed neutrally.

“Oh, I had a ship. Dohar presented me with an X-wing before I left. A used one, but in excellent condition, and with an astromech as well. He actually wanted to give me a small yacht, but I managed to talk him out of that.”

So the family Kyp left behind was not only kind to him, but wealthy as well. How many people, even amongst his students, would have refused such a chance? Especially taking Kyp’s background into consideration. He should never again doubt Kyp’s devotion to the Order, Luke thought. Never.

He was interrupted by a quiet laugh. “Augwynne Djo got conniptions when I quite impudently landed it in the middle of their summer camp. With the entire clan gathering around, no one could claim capturing me, so it messed up their rituals quite a bit. Then I handed them Kirana’s message and very earnestly pleaded with them to take me as a student. I guess all of that put together really got them confused, because they kept council for a good two hours, during which I stayed right where I was, listening to the comments on various parts of my anatomy from a hundred women armed to the teeth, and thinking about what I’d gotten myself into. In the end they decided that as a male-witch, and one that came willingly with a worthy purpose, I could stay, and come and go freely.” Kyp smirked. “They gave me the status of an honorary woman.”

Luke choked on the last bite of his last tuber. “You’re so not female, Kyp!”

The young man laughed. “Oh, believe me, they knew that! It was just a way to make my presence socially acceptable.”

A wicked thought entered Luke’s mind. “Did they make a leather garb for you?”

“Yeah,” Kyp said absently. “Said that my flightsuit was an offence to their aesthetic feelings.” He noticed a gleam in Luke’s eyes suddenly. “What? Oh no, Skywalker! That’s frigging kinky!”

“Right,” Luke squeezed out between the bouts of giggles. “And what we did just a bit ago isn’t?”

“Depends on your definition of kinky, I guess. Anyway, don’t get your hopes and certain body parts up. I left it on Dathomir.”

“Pity, that.” Luke was marveling at himself. From anguished brooding to a very open innuendo in a span of two or three hours. What did his psyche manage to settle inside, without him even noticing?

“Well, I plan to return there, and I didn’t feel like carrying it with me.”

Luke’s laugh died a quick death. “You want to return?”

“Yeah. I guess now I’ll have to, not that I mind in the least. They took me, gave me everything I wanted, taught me patiently, and allowed me the freedom to be what I am and do what I want, but I agreed to one reciprocal courtesy.”

“Which is?”

Kyp shrugged awkwardly. “Me. My genes. They are really starting to notice that their genetic pool has gotten more than a bit limited. Kirana told me it might come to that, so I knew what to expect, don’t worry.”

“But...”

“There won’t be many. That would have defied the purpose. Luke, after my time on Argovia I realized something. I might never get to have a family. Look at us – we’re a sorry bunch in this respect. Who’d want to mate with us, with our weirdness, our strange conflicts, and a very real possibility of death on each mission? We have only ourselves... and a very few others who are able to take it. What are the odds? And I suddenly understood one important thing. If I am to die tomorrow, or in a year, or in two, I want to have something of me left in this world besides a couple of supernovae where star systems used to be. And if it’s a Dathomiri witch that wants to bear my child, why not? It’s not the worst of all worlds, far from it, despite your less than shiny memories.”

That was Kyp in his essence, Luke thought wryly. Where he would have brooded and agonized over a dilemma for months, if not years, weighting all pros and cons, Kyp had thought about the problem, made up his mind, found a solution, and implemented it – all in the span of days, if not hours. And if it didn’t work out like he expected, he would accept the consequences and live with them, Luke was sure. But regrets over the road not taken wouldn’t be a part of it. It would be interesting to see how much of that decisiveness Kyp would retain in ten years or so, though.

“So, you are going to visit your children?” Luke asked.

“Yes, of course. We made a deal – if there are any boys, I can take them with me at any time, it’s up to me. Girls will stay on Dathomir until they are sixteen, and then they will decide for themselves if they want to stay or not. Mother Augwynne was pretty sure they’d want to stay. I’m welcome to visit at any time, and if I decide to stay for good, that’s all right too.” He threw a quick glance in Luke’s direction. “I won’t, of course, but it’s nice to have that option. Even without the children, I still would return. There are some people who’ll wait for me there. And I bet there are things I haven’t managed to learn yet.”

“You’re mentioning it again and again. Kyp, I can take a hint. What is it that you’ve learned there?”

He saw humor sparkling in the long green eyes. “Something that you managed to miss totally in your teachings... and in your life, I suspect. I thought about you a lot while I was there, about the way you were teaching us. Why is it that in all the exercises you were giving, in all your meditations, the only focus you were giving was always spiritual, and very particular? Get out of your body – isn’t that your mantra? Concentrate outwards or inwards, but never on the physical. Well, you know what? It doesn’t work like that. You can’t disregard your body, you can’t treat it as merely a useful tool, which you need to keep in working condition, and nothing more. That’s what I have been learning there. That’s the witches’ conception – that physical and spiritual are two sides of the same coin; you can’t have one without the other.”

Kyp was becoming agitated and increasingly serious. “Just as you need to nourish and tune your spirit, you need to do that with your body to achieve the full connection with the Force and the world surrounding you. And pleasure is a big part of it, although not the sole focus. Tell me, Luke, how often have you thought about it? Did you ever put pleasure as a goal for one of your exercises? No, of course not, I know. Well, you better start soon, or the next time your body decides to rebel on you, you might not be lucky enough to have me around. And the longer you suppress something, the more spectacular is the blowout. I should know,” he whispered after a pause.

Luke didn’t even try to pretend he didn’t understand. “What it was for you?” he asked hoarsely.

He saw the muscles of Kyp’s jaws tightening “Fear,” the young man answered at last. “I was so ashamed of being afraid, tried so hard to suppress it, and then I became completely helpless to deal with it in any other way except anger. Lots and lots of anger. Do you know how hard it has been, to learn how to live with fear? Feeling it instead of denying, dealing with it...”

The parallels were not hard to make. Kyp had been denying his fears – and it ended up with a giant explosion of fear-induced fury. Uncontrollable and unstoppable. He had been denying his body the attention it needed, the pleasures it craved, considering them unnecessary and unseemly – and it ended up with an explosion of uncontrollable lust. Probably Kyp was right. Probably he should go back to Dathomir and let the Sisters teach him. On the other hand, why wait? Kyp was already here, and so was Kirana Ti, come to think of it.

“Kyp, how about teaching some of the things you learned to the students? And to me, if you want.”

The young man smiled. “You, I can teach. But these techniques aren’t suited for a group, unless you plan on having an orgy afterwards.” Luke shuddered and Kyp chuckled. “Although it could improve the climate in this academy. Luke, most of these exercises do end up with sex, in one form or another, that’s why Kirana never told you about it. Sex is just a logical conclusion, and she doesn’t feel this way about you.

"They had to modify some of the workings for me – apparently, male physiology is different, and I was getting excited sooner than it was supposed to happen. I got better with it toward the end – learned how to delay it, how to keep my body on this fine edge for quite a long time. After some time you start to see why they put so much emphasis on it – physical starts to blend with spiritual, and you find out that the surest way to get out of your body is through your body. Damn. It’s really not something I can explain. But I can show you.”

Luke looked at him suspiciously. “I don’t think I’ve quite recuperated yet.”

Kyp laughed. “This one doesn’t include sex. Or, rather, it can, but it’s not obligatory. You can go to sleep afterwards just as well.”

“That might be a good idea. I have a class to teach in the morning.”

“A new bunch or the old ones?”

“Novices. Actually, my first thought upon realizing you were back was that you could take them from now on. You’re good at motivating people.”

“Oh? Is that a new term for whipping butts? I’ll take them, don’t worry. Now, do you want me to show you or not?”

“Yes, please.”

“Lie down then, on your stomach. And relax. Do I need to emphasize the undesirability of too much thinking again?”

Luke smiled. “No, I think I’ve learned that part by now.”

“Good. Stretch your hands out over your head, please.”

Kyp began to hum a simple, monotonous melody, running his palms flat over Luke’s body, from the hands down, gradually increasing the pressure until it became something between a caress and a massage. He kept it up for some time, moving lower and lower, and Luke felt uneasy when he guessed what would come next.

The humming ceased, and Kyp slapped him lightly on the object of his considerations. “Thinking again,” he said disapprovingly. “Do I really need to mind-wham you?”

“Kyp...”

“Relax,” Kyp said softly. “By the end of it, you might beg me for the thing you’re so afraid of now. But it isn’t going to happen, more’s the pity.”

“Why?” He could feel Kyp’s low thrum of arousal, and the last, almost unnoticed vestiges of doubt disappeared from his mind. Kyp did want him, and not only in response to Luke’s own need.

“You’re not ready, that’s why... neither in mind nor in body. I’m not selfish enough to spoil a perfectly good night by wanting too much. Hush... or I will just stop.”

“When did you become so wise?” Luke asked lightly. He meant the words as a joke, but as soon as he said it, he felt them rang much more true than he had intended.

“You’re making a perpetual and very annoying mistake of underestimating me. Now hush.”

The humming resumed. The sound was very soothing, and listening to it also served to occupy Luke’s mind. He drifted on the waves of the simple melody like he had drifted earlier in the lake’s waters, nourished by the feeling of contentment. He couldn’t even remember the last time he felt so at peace.

Kyp’s hands returned to Luke’s body, beginning the journey all over again, from his hands down. The pressure, light and caressing at first, intensified, making blood to rush to the skin's surface, warming and sensitizing it. He took Luke right to the point where the force of the rub and the roughness of his hands were on a verge of becoming unpleasant, and then repeated all the motions in backward order, gradually easing back to the light caresses. By that time, Luke was as relaxed as he thought it possible, and then a couple degrees further.

He idly wondered what was going to come next, and the answer came quickly. He heard a quiet crack, and the air became tinged with a familiar ozone odor, while at the same time the muscle in his right arm, which had been quietly aching for a couple of days now, began to reflexively contract and relax under the sting of a low-level electrical discharge.

The sensation was strange, but not unpleasant – it was tingling and rippling, it tickled and warmed, all at the same time. By the time Kyp finished with his arm, rubbed it down, and moved to the next muscle knot, the pain was gone, replaced with the sensation of pooling warmth. Every ache in Luke’s body, old or new, got the same treatment. Some were so old that he had stopped noticing the pain long ago, and only the absence of it made him aware that it had, in fact, been there.

“You can make a fortune with this trick,” Luke mumbled happily.

“I’ll keep that in mind. Especially since the chap who employs me is a credit-pinching snerp.”

Luke would have laughed, if he hadn’t been too relaxed for that. “I resent the adjective. The word is ‘frugal’, Kyp. I don’t have a free credit to pinch.”

Kyp’s answer was a very derogatory snort. Then the next sensation came – a different type of warmth. This one was clearly emanating from something, dry and palpable. It was very much like... oh, yes. A smoldering ember. Luke vividly imagined the picture – Kyp’s hand, suspended above the sole of his right foot, and a fiery, dark red ember floating over his body, kept in a firm telekinetic hold at just the right distance. Kyp kept it like that, moving it closer to Luke’s skin bit by bit, for a minute or two, and then switched to the other foot.

There was a system to Kyp’s ministrations, Luke guessed after some time. The points weren’t chosen at random – from the soles of his feet Kyp moved to the tender spots behind the knees, then to his perineum – and if Luke weren’t tranquil almost to the point of torpor, that one might have got him moving, but no, Kyp obviously knew what he was doing, and the ember stayed at a safe distance. Each point was pulsating after the application of heat, a feeling Luke had no comparison for. Coccyx was next, and then the top of the sacral plate. From that point Kyp started to move up along the spine, making consecutive stops along the way, leaving Luke’s body suffused with the tidal, unfamiliar warmth in its wake. Even Luke’s pulse seemed to be fuller now, and he could feel the blood rushing through the vessels with a vigor he would have thought of as being absolutely incompatible with his current repose. It was almost... all right, it was a lot like sexual excitement, but instead of being concentrated in his genitals, it seemed to be diffused all over his body.

Kyp was up to the base of his skull now, and the pulsation became so strong that Luke started to feel the first, distant signs of an approaching headache. Kyp, apparently, felt that too, because after a short pause – used to obtain another ember, Luke presumed – he begun to move down the same path, and the insistent waves of Luke’s pulse seemed to follow, leaving him a bit lightheaded.

All thoughts and worries disappeared from Luke’s mind. What was left was his body, excited and tranquil, boneless and barely feeling its weight, trembling with sexual arousal and completely powerless to do anything to satisfy it. If Luke would have been capable of thinking right now, he would have admitted that Kyp had been right. If he could, he would have been begging for release, no matter the means. But he couldn’t, so the only option left to him was just lie there, waiting for what Kyp might decide to dish out to him next.

The hands returned now, hovering right above Luke’s body, close enough that he could feel their warmth, bit not close enough to touch. Their warmth seemed to be not quite natural; less than the embers, but more than could have been expected from a human’s body. They hovered over Luke’s lower back, moving in circles above each buttock, and the pulsating energy seemed to move with them, being redistributed to every cell, every molecule of Luke’s body. Up again, then down, still in circles, not leaving any body part unattended, dissipating the arousal and replacing it with peaceful, restful vitality that felt so wonderful and overwhelming that Luke’s eyes began to fill with tears.

“That’s it,” he heard a whisper, and then his body was covered with another body, which felt better than any blanket he ever used in his life. “Sleep well, Luke. In the morning our night of freedom will be over, and we will return to what we are. You will be a respected Master again and I will revert to a perfect little Jedi. Masks, masks, and more masks. Sleep well, and for Force’s sake, don’t brood over it in the morning!”

Luke wanted to wish Kyp good night, too, but fell asleep before the thought had a chance to become an action.

***

He woke up bathed in the orange light of Yavin, amidst the busy sounds of a late morning, and sat up in a rush, throwing off the heavy cloth that covered him. ‘Where am I?’ was his first thought, then ‘Oh, flarg, I missed the class!’, and then the events of the previous night came back to him in a rush. His frustrated despair, his run through the jungle, then Kyp. Kyp and his wonderful body; Kyp and his strange manipulations; Kyp and the heady, consuming lust, Kyp and the easy generosity with which he accepted and shared it. Kyp and his last words, uttered with a confident certainty of what he, Luke, might do the morning after...

Well, he could at least prove Kyp wrong on this one. He wasn’t going to brood. Think, oh yes. There was a lot to think about, but not right now. He had to return to the temple; his absence would have been surely noticed, and his students and friends might have started to worry. Something was telling him not to stand up just yet, though.

Luke looked around. Every trace of Kyp was gone. Only the sleeping bag remained, and his own clothes, folded neatly on the sand not far from him. His lightsaber was lying beside his right hand, just in the place where he would have felt for it reflexively in case of danger. And there was something else as well – a wide circle, drawn around him in the sand, about five meters in diameter. Luke stretched out a probe and smiled. It was a spherical Force field, not strong enough to protect him, but sufficient to send a noticeable ripple as an alarm signal if touched. A neat trick - he would have to ask Kyp how he had managed to keep it erect and working in his absence. With a small gesture Luke dissipated it and stood up.

He dressed quickly, wrinkling his nose in disgust upon finding that his boots were still wet, and spurted into a top-speed run without bothering with warm-ups. He felt like he could run around the entire moon right now, and then probably move a couple of mountains to cool off. He hadn’t felt so good in years, filled to the brim with bubbling energy. Luke didn’t fool himself; he knew that the feeling wasn’t going to last, but even a temporary respite was a precious gift. At least now he had some idea about what was wrong with him. It could be dealt with, and the path was open, no matter how strange and bizarre it seemed to be. And he had Kyp to thank for that. Kyp, the green-eyed enigma who claimed that Luke underestimated him. Constantly.

He was probably right about that, as well.

Luke burst out of the clearing around the temple, and almost ran into Tionne. Of-kriffin’-course, as Kyp would have said, she just had to be the first one he came across.

“Master Skywalker!” she exclaimed. “Thank the Force you’re back! Kyp told us you might be late, but there are a couple of urgent transmissions from Coruscant you need to take a look at, and I need to finalize our supply list with you – it has to be transmitted today, or we’ll have to pay a late fee...”

He wasn’t even listening to her, didn’t hear anything past Kyp’s name. “Kyp is here?” Only now he realized that all the time since his awakening he was afraid that the young man would simple take off and disappear again, for who knew how long...

Tionne wrinkled her brow, looking at him in puzzlement. “Of course he’s here. He said that he’d met you earlier, and you told him you might be late. He also took the morning class, he said you’d ordered him to teach it. Didn’t you?”

“Yes, I did,” Luke hurried to assure her. “Where is he now?”

She was still perplexed. “On the second floor terrace, I believe. He said he wanted to meditate for a while.” She smiled suddenly, warmly. “It’s good to have him back. The place seems more alive somehow.”

“Thanks, Tionne,” Luke answered distractedly and ran to the temple.

“Master Skywalker!” she called after him. “Transmissions! Supply list!”

“Later!” he yelled back.

He needed to see Kyp. Why, he didn’t know. Probably to reassure himself he wouldn’t get overcome by lust again from looking at him. Probably to make sure the whole thing wasn’t some elaborate fantasy. Probably just to say ‘thank you’. But that was what he needed to do.

The door to the terrace opened, and in its frame, Luke could see the familiar figure, sitting cross-legged with his back to the door, showered in orange light. “Kyp?” he said with a voice that suddenly became hoarse.

The figure untangled his legs, rose up, and turned to him. For a quick, almost infinitesimal moment Luke saw the dancing flickers of warmth and amusement in the vivid green eyes, and then the long dark lashes lowered, and Kyp bowed his head respectfully.

“Master Skywalker,” he said in a polite, neutral voice.